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2013年7月20日土曜日

One of the most frequently asked questions I get on my channel and on
tumblr is "How did you learn Japanese?" So finally I decided to make a
video in English about it! And just in case you'd rather skim a blog
post than watch a fairly lengthy video, here you go! Loading this one up
with links, so I hope you find something you like.

My Japanese isn't perfect!

In fact, it's pretty
far from it. I'm still studying and trying to perfect it and I've got a
long way to go. That said, my Japanese is fairly functional, so I can
give advice from that standpoint!

Find a class! (If you can.)

Self-studying Japanese is one of the hardest things I've ever done. If you can
find a class, language partner, or study group near you then take the
plunge and sign up! Self-studying can be a real challenge and without a
teacher to correct your mistakes and put pressure on you to memorise
vocabularly you have to be very, very motivated. That said, it can be done, so don't stop reading!

Learn Kana!

Learning how to read and write
hiragana and katakana is really important so start from there! Trust me,
they're a lot easier than kanji is.

By the way, I learn kanji by rote memorisation. I sit down with a bunch of kanji I don't know and write them over and over. Then I write them without looking. Then I test myself, etc. After memorising them it's really important to go back to them later because kanji love to just up and disappear from your memory.

Find a Good Textbook!

If you're part of a class then you'll probably have to use what the curriculum is written around, but here's my favourite:For beginners: GENKI I
This
textbook is logically-structured and easy to follow. The grammar points
are explained in depth and there are tonnes of exercises to help you! Check it out on Amazon, I page through it in the above video.

Next up: GENKI II
Like GENKI I this is an awesome textbook and will help to fill out your elementary Japanese knowledge! Check it out on Amazon.

My Studying Face

NIHONGO SO-MATOME
These books are written to prepare you for the JLPT but even if you're not going to
be taking the exam they are pretty good. I particularly like the
grammar and kanji ones although I struggle with the vocabulary ones
since they are basically just long lists of vocab you have to memorise.
It's probably best to page through them at a bookstore (if you can) to
get an idea of which level is right for you.

MINNA NO NIHONGO
This
is another widely-used textbook series and I think it might include
more situational, practical Japanese. However, I have never used this
series. If you don't like the sound of Genki, check these out.

Intermediate/Advanced Level Resources
Once
you reach a certain level I feel like there aren't any Holy Grail
textbooks. It's probably better to move on to things like: Japanese
magazines, books, manga, newspapers, and so on. Don't feel discouraged
if it's really hard at firstand try to find things that match
your ability or are just slightly higher. If you try reading NewsWeek in
Japanese right away you might just headdesk.

White & Nerdy

IMMERSION!

You don't actually have to go to
Japan to immerse yourself in Japanese but it does help! If you have the
opportunity to come here as a student I recommend it 100% but even if
you don't have the opportunity to come to Japan right now you can start
by surrounding yourself with Japanese media: music, films, drama and
anime. If you can make some Japanese friends or work in a places where
you get the opportunity to speak Japanese that will help you a lot too!

Change
your computer/phone/everything to Japanese (just memorise how to change
it back first because all those kanji can be pretty overwhelming!). I
have all my devices set to Japanese which is actually kind of tough
when you're doing a lot of video editing!!!!

View FaceBook and Twitter in Japanese! Set your homepage to a Japanese website! Just go for gold!

SPEAK.

I'd studied Japanese a bit before coming
to Japan but when I got here I found it so hard to form a sentence. I
was devastatingly shy and terrified of making mistakes.
These two things do not go well with language learning! You have to make mistakes in order to learn!
I still screw up all the time. I remember how much it hurt when I
messed up kage (shadow) with hige (beard) during a job and everyone
laughed their butts off at me. But thanks to that I will never make that
mistake again! So do not be afraid to say something ridiculously wrong.
It's the way you learn. Laugh at your mistakes. Don't take them to heart.

One of the ways I learnt to speak Japanese was by making vlogs in Japanese. Once I had a Japanese audience I kind of had to speak Japanese even if it was really hard. Through this I learnt a lot and was able to keep my motivation up!

(Also talking to yourself is totally cool.)

Use the internet as a supplementary learning tool!

Hannah talks about this in her video below:

There
are tonnes of Japanese people who want to learn English and will be
happy to talk with you! Just don't invite them to your house or anything
:P

Rikaichan is a great addon to help decipher kanji and unfamiliar words (just don't rely on it too much!!!). Twitter is a great place to practice Japanese and talk to Japanese people.
My favourite dictionary is Jim Breen's WWWJDIC. It's free and really really good. Lang-8 is a site where people will correct your Japanese! I think it's free!
And of course there's always YouTube!!!

Just remember that the internet is a supplementary tool! You're still going to have to buckle down and study if you want to become better than me at Japanese (and I 100% expect you to become better than me, not even kidding around here).

DO A LITTLE EVERYDAY!

It's so hard sometimes to sit down and immerse yourself in language learning so try not to forget how fun that time can be. Find the place you study best - for me it's in a cafe or library - and find time to go there and study! Carry your textbooks around if you have to! They might give you a backache but that backache will be nagging you to studying. I mean, you don't want to lug them around all day and then not study at all, right?

恐竜ハンターみめい

ターミメイターのブログへようこそ！ファション、メイク、音楽、動画を作ること、意味のないことが大好きなみめいです！ユーチューブも是非チェックしてね！みめいチャンネル★Hi, I'm Mimei, or rather, the Termimeitor~ This is my bilingual blog! I like lots of shiny things, like make-up, fashion, making vids, and basically nonsense! I also make videos on YouTube here♥